


Darkness

by CozyCryptidCorner



Category: Original Work, exophilia - Fandom
Genre: Banter, Exophilia, Gen, Human/Monster Romance, Monster Lovers - Freeform, Troll - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:28:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23941564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CozyCryptidCorner/pseuds/CozyCryptidCorner
Summary: You've been rescued by a mysterious blind apothecary from the battlefield you were slowly dying on. Since he doesn't need to see, he doesn't provide you for with any means of sight, either, and you suppose that it might be wasteful to spend any candles on you since your outlook is grim. Still, you'd like to see your rescuer before you die. Or go mad from the darkness.
Relationships: Reader/Monster, Reader/Troll
Comments: 10
Kudos: 148





	Darkness

There’s blood seeping from the wound on your leg, despite your best attempts to apply pressure. You swallow thickly, trying to stumble your way through the denseness of the forest, one of your hands busy holding a crumpled mess of rags against the bullet hole, the other working to keep your balance. The scent of gunpowder is thick in the hot summer air, you feel suffocated by it, head dizzy with the need for breath and blood. You almost trip over the corpse of a fallen comrade, though you don’t know her name, and you send a feverish prayer up to anyone who is listening that her path to the afterlife will be merciful and swift.

Again, you stumble, hearing someone scream about the advancement of the enemy line. Shaking, you lift the rags off your leg, just to check to see if the bleeding has stopped yet, but there’s still a trickle forming. Letting out a soft, frustrated breath, you turn to see another soldier running, dodging the trees, in retreat. Your voice is parched, cracking when you try to call out for aid, but no one comes, and just beyond, you see the bright red colors of the opposing forces. With a layer of sweat on your forehead, you stumble, back hitting the front of a rock formation jutting out from the earth.

You let yourself slide down, leaning your head back, trying to keep your leg as straight as possible. You’ve already lost your pistol somewhere; otherwise, you’d most likely put it up to your temple and fire. To be a wounded soldier, slowly bleeding out on the battlefield is one thing, but to then be captured by the opposing army? You know the torture methods often used on either side.

Slowly, as to not aggravate the wound, you scoot over, feeling the tiny, pebble-sized bullet rubbing up against your raw muscles in the process. There, almost hidden by the bushes, is a crack running up from the ground, large enough to likely fit your body, and small enough to hopefully not be noticeable. As you hear the victorious, leering shouts coming up from the west, you carefully angle your body, adrenaline roaring through your blood, trying to be precise instead of fast.

The coolness of the rock brings a soft, balmy relief to your fevering skin, and you manage to slide into the small cave just as a twig snaps in a location too close for your comfort. The actual interior is blessedly bigger than the entrance would have you believe, so you have room to settle yourself down, leg limply laying against the stone, and you’re so close to fainting, you can feel your vision fizzling in and out of focus. Still, hearing footsteps tromping around the forest is the last fraying string keeping your consciousness from falling, and you find yourself having to scoot backward.

Again, the cave seems so much longer than when you first though, because even though you have retreated far enough away from the entrance to the point where the light is almost too dim to see. Or maybe the blood loss is just messing with your vision. Voices, there are voices faintly talking, you find yourself managing to move further back, your locomotion jerking, silent, but odd, pushing against the ground with your uninjured leg, one hand still on your wound, the other used for balance and thrust. It goes fine until you reach behind you again and find nothing, and just as suddenly, you’re slipping, falling, and landing on the dirty stone a few yards down.

You manage not to make too much noise, despite the fact you’d like to let out a scream a string of expletives that would call on the four horsemen. It’s pitch black, you can only see the faintest hint of daylight on the ledge you came from, but it’s much too high for you to even reach even if you somehow find the strength and tenacity to stand. Your face is soaked with your quiet sobbing, though you manage not to let out more than a couple of hiccuping squeaks. Still, you wonder if it would even matter if you made noise. Maybe you should, trying alone in a cave might be worse than whatever would happen to you outside.

You don’t know how long you lay here, limp, exhausted, face up against the unforgiving stone. The faint glimmer slowly dims, the only sign that night has come, but there is nothing for you to do about it. You don’t think that you broke any bones during the fall; however, at this point, your body has seemingly given up on life. You’ve long stopped crying out of pure determination to not dehydrate, like that’s not the least of your worries, and you must be drifting in and out of consciousness because of the few lucid dreams slogging through the front of your skull.

Footsteps. At first, you figure it’s another one of your lucid dreams because surely no one is down here with you. A softer sound follows, like someone setting a bundle of fabric down, and then… then you feel the presence of another person, waking up fully from whatever partially catatonic state you were in. You don’t know what you should do, scream? Beg for help? You can’t even see what they look like, so you don’t even know if you should be bracing for the worst.

Letting out a little whimper, you try to scootch away from their prying hands, which have taken to patting down your body, but they compensate, following your movement, gently pressing down against your chest area, squeezing different places on your arms and legs. When they come down to the bullet wound, pain springs up from the nerves, a hot, pinching thrust of rippling sharpness running through your body. You don’t even try to hold yourself back, you have to let out a choking sob, the air pushing up from your lungs as tears burst into your eyes.

“Ah,” the voice says, almost under the speaker’s breath, in full understanding.

You’re shaking now, though you don’t know why. All the muscles in your body seem to want to convulse, your teeth chattering, and while you’d like to talk, say something among the lines of who are you, you can’t seem to get your tongue to corporate. Something’s tied around your leg, you can barely feel it, even though you’re certain it’s done tightly. You don’t even think you could wiggle your toes, it seems futile to try to because you can’t see.

There’s another sound, like a blanket being snapped out of its folded state, and you are slowly rolled over on top of some kind of thin but coarse material. The movement sends all sorts of pain bursting through the wound you know you have, and the ones you didn’t even realize were inflicted in the fall. You must pass out because a different kind of blackness overtakes everything, and when you seem to be able to actually think again, your back is on a soft, plush mattress.

You can’t sit up, the muscles and bones of your body seemingly just give up. It’s quiet, save for some rustling coming from the other side, and you can hear your body quake and moan as you slowly breathe. There’s a pillow underneath your head, propping you up slightly, though the room is as pitch as the hole you came from. The wound on your leg still throbs, though it’s a different kind of pain, like fresh wasp stings on a bitterly cold morning, and when you manage to shift your legs slightly, you don’t feel the sharp stab of pain as a pea-sized object shifts.

Someone is in the room with you, you can feel their presence the same way you feel the oppressive darkness. Trying to keep your voice from trembling, you call out, though quietly, still in fear of being caught by the opposing army. “Who- who’s there?”

There’s a quiet stirring, fabric folding together as someone moves, and you feel them approach the bed, slowly, though still staying a distance from where you lay. “Who are you?”

“I am-” you’re not in the position to make demands, so you try to quell your desperate tone. “I am no one of consequence, sir.”

“I see.”

“Can you?” The wound does nothing to quell your (or perhaps horridly dull, given the circumstances) wit, though you are quick to inwardly cringe at yourself. Before you can even apologize for your unbecoming behavior, he responds.

“No.”

You let a beat pass, then ask, almost timidly, “perhaps lighting a candle might help?”

The voice lets out a quiet chuckle, then says, “I’m afraid that would do nothing to bring back my sight.”

Oh. Oh, fuck.

“I apologize!” You’ve been awake for only a few moments, and you’ve just insulted your host, who has, for all you know, done this all out of the very pure kindness of his heart. “My god, I didn’t realize- I’m so sorry-”

“No need for such formalities,” he doesn’t sound upset, almost amused. “You did not know, and I do not consider this an ailment or curse.”

His knuckles brush against your forehead and cheek, checking for signs of fever, then retract. You hear some more movement, he’s walking to another side of the room, and… well, he’s doing something, but you don’t know what.

Unsure of where to go from there, you try, “th-thank you for giving me your aid.”

“I’d rather not have a corpse rotting where the best picks of mushrooms are grown.”

“I- um, understand, that would significantly lower their quality.” You wait, again, for the silence to wash away your statement, then try again. “Who… if it would please you to tell me… are you?”

A pause. You think he puts down whatever he’s holding. “I am like you, I suppose. Someone of no consequence.”

“A skilled one, though,” you take a gander, “because I’m not dead.”

“You’re not dead, yet,” he reminds, “a many manner of things might go wrong from here.”

You think that over. “I have faith in you.”

It sounds like he chokes, though he tries to cover it up. After a moment spent regaining his composure, he says, “then I suppose I will try not to disappoint.”

You settle back down, finally relaxing against the plushness of the bed, eyes slowly drooping with exhaustion. It’s not that you trust him, specifically, but at this point? You have no choice. You’re in no place to walk out of wherever you are, not in this darkness, and not with that slowly healing leg. You might as well hope that fate has dropped you in the best possible hands for recovery and try your best to do so.

With the lack of light, it’s sort of difficult to gauge when you fall asleep, versus when you fully wake back up. Moving helps, lifting your hand to slowly smack yourself on the forehead gives you a strong enough sting to conclude that you are, in fact, awake and alive. You listen for a few moments, trying to discern where exactly your medic is, then call out, quietly, “hello?”

Nothing.

You swallow thickly. Even though you don’t fully trust your rescuer, his absence isn’t still something that you find… well, unpleasant. Sitting alone in the dark isn’t what you will categorize as a good time, either, and since you can’t move your injured leg, so it’s not like you can get up and start looking for him. Or even explore to make sure you’re not being held by some kind of mad scientist.

You try to relax again, letting your muscles unwind, trying to even out your breathing. The silence is deafening; you’re used to having countless neighbors, either in the army encampments, or the town apartment you rent. There’s always someone up, no matter the hour, stomping around on the floor above you, having a passionate love affair in a nearby tent, or just being a clumsy drunk on the side of the street. You’re not wholly certain how to handle this… quiet.

Again, you must fall asleep, because you have to slog your way back inside your brain when you hear a soft clatter, like you’ve been gently pulled in from a void. You try to raise your head, finding your neck stiff with soreness, but still mobile enough to lift off the pillow, and after blinking as hard as possible, you realize that it’s still pitch dark. An odd detail, you suppose, because that would mean that the room you are in has no windows… and most buildings you know don’t exactly lack that feature. Could you be in the basement, then?

“Is it you?” You ask, softly, afraid that it might not be.

“Yes,” the answer is calm, and not sharing your tense quietness.

“Do you know the time?”

There’s a quiet pause, and you hear footsteps slowly step over to another end of the room. “Late afternoon,” he says, “but you have been asleep for three days.”

“Oh.” You hadn’t realized how long you had been resting. Tentatively, you reach down to your trousers, finding the bottom half of the injured leg torn away, starting a few inches above the wound. The bullet hole in your leg is wrapped in a few tight layers of bandages. Reaching back up to your stomach, you pat at the cloth, finding your undershirt still on, though the rest of your garments, your socks, your outerwear, gone. Well, it does kind of make you feel a tad bit more comfortable to realize that he hadn’t changed you himself, even if he wouldn’t be able to see.

“I suppose that you are hungry.”

“I… am,” you don’t want to admit it, because you feel like more of a burden than you already are.

“You will start with broth,” there’s a muted poking noise, “as to not overwhelm your already struggling system. Solids will come after a few days, but you must rest in the meantime.”

You hadn’t really thought that you would be spending that long here, though the idea isn’t exactly what you would call… appealing. “But- but is it safe for you to keep me here?”

There’s a dull clack, you realize he must have dropped something. “I- as long as you don’t make too much noise, and you don’t leave this room, we both will be fine.”

“So the king’s army has made advancements, then.” You lay your head back on the pillow, feeling a creeping sense of dread crawling through your stomach. “Really- sir, you have already done enough. If one of them finds me here, you might be liable for execution.”

“Oh-” the odd tenseness is suddenly gone from his voice, “I don’t think they will specifically be the problem in this situation.”

“Have they not overrun the town?”

“Not… not this town.”

You don’t know where you are, then. Maybe the small village closer to the mountains? “Are they approaching, though?”

“No.”

“Oh.” You think for a moment, trying to come up with the local geography, but you don’t exactly know much about the area. “Do you have a name?”

“Enoch.” The way he says his own name is lovely, the end hard and brutal.

“Enoch,” you echo, closing your eyes to commit it to memory. “Where are we?”

Another pause, then, slowly, he says, “... Brekka.”

“Brekka?” You haven’t heard of it. “Is that far from Sugar Creek?”

He mutters something under his breath, then speaks up, “no, I suppose not, if it is close to where I found you.”

“But it’s-”

“Enough with the questions,” he sounds almost exhausted, and the footsteps approach, “hold out your hands.”

“Why.” In the pitch black, and having heard those words before, in a not so innocent setting, you are suspicious.

“Because I’m giving you a mug of broth.”

You let out a puff of breath, doing as he says, and soon enough, there’s a warm, stone-like object placed in your hands. Gradually, carefully, he helps you sit up, packing some more pillows and blankets behind your back to not strain your spine. The broth is literally the tastiest thing you’ve ever had in your entire life, though maybe you’re a bit biased given the circumstances, and he has to physically stop you from downing that thing like a pint of beer on the night before your day off.

“You’re going to make yourself sick,” he chides, calloused hands covering yours to keep you from tipping the thing all the way over your mouth. The bed shifts with his weight as he leans against it, his leg brushing up against yours. “Sip- sip, god damn it.”

You let out a frustrated grunt, but you obey. Once he decides that you can be trusted to handle it on your own, he steps away, and you’re left to sullenly hold the mug on your own, taking a loud, pointed slurp every now and then. “Do you have a family?”

“We all come from somewhere.”

You roll your eyes. “But now, though, do you live with people? Are there others nearby? Should I be extra quiet, or can I be as loud as I want when you poke around my leg again?”

“Oh.” At your clarification, he seems less… tense? Defensive? “That isn’t a high priority, but I suppose that people will come to investigate if you do it continuously.”

“Do people usually scream when under your care?” Should you be feeling nervous now?

“I’m an apothecary trained in field medicine,” he says, “screaming customers come in from time to time.”

“Huh.” That explains some things, like how you no longer feel like you’re on death’s doorstep, along with the absence of the bullet in your leg. “You’re a good one, too.”

“Not really,” he sounds almost embarrassed, “my patient is just too stubborn to die.”

“And here I’ve been told my stubbornness is my least attractive quality.”

“No,” he says, acting surprised, “truly?”

You finish your soup, then hand the mug back to him when he comes from it, and lay yourself back down on the bed. Even though you have only been up for a few minutes, you’re almost numb with exhaustion at this point, and you’re already down to take another nap. The heat of the broth does nothing to help you stay awake, either, because, at this point, you feel like you’re the perfect temperature to lull off.

“I have to go,” he says, “I must help with the clinic.”

“Mm,” you mumble, only half awake, “say hi to them for me.”

“I... probably will not do that,” he’s amused, you can tell, “but I will be back tonight to check on you.”

“Okay.”

The void embraces you again, dragging you down its murky depths like a long spited lover. You don’t know how long you stay asleep for, only that waking up is an effort you avoid for quite some time. A part of your brain seems to perk up long before everything else, letting a memory of the battlefield before the actual shots began firing play out in sequence. You don’t want to see it again, but even as the lucid part of your mind tries to shake it off, it sticks, starting again from the beginning.

The face of the girl you saw dead smiles as she loads her gun. One of your friends makes some kind of weird sex joke, his voice echoing around your ears like they’re a deep valley. The captain looking off in the distance, a worry crinkling in her eyes and forehead. Blood. Everywhere. Dripping from the trees like a steady rainfall.

“Wake up.”

You choke, trying to jerk arms away from whoever has you, finding a pitch room, your lungs unable to keep up with the demand with the rest of your body.

“Stop- stop thrashing, you’re fine-”

It takes you a long second to fully calm down, gasping, body trembling like a leaf in a thunderstorm. “Enoch? I- I um,”

“Hush.” A hand comes up to pet your hair away from your sweaty face. “A nightmare, nothing more. Give yourself a moment to recollect.”

You lay on the bed, limp, hot, a pain throbbing in the back of your eyes. There’s a strange queasiness in your stomach, the same kind of churning nausea that follows a night of heavy drinking. Carefully, you swallow, wishing you had some point in the room to stare at to steady your thrashing stomach.

“You have a fever,” he says, as though that weren’t obvious. “Hopefully, with a few hours of sleep, it will slowly ebb away.”

“Is it, do you think it’s because-”

“Your leg?” His hands reach over to the bullet hole, gently pressing against the bandaged flesh. “Most likely. Your skin is puffy with inflammation.”

You tense, fear taking your stomach in its grip, and squeezing, “will it- will it have to be amputated?”

“Not if I have anything to do about it.” He stands, the mattress returning from its altered state, and he walks over to another end of the room.

“What are you doing?”

“Stay still,” he says, “I’m fetching supplies from the shop, I won’t be long.”

So you do as he says, as though you might have the energy to accomplish anything else. Even though you are just… so… so tired, you don’t seem to have the energy to actually go to sleep. The pain pulsing up from your leg keeps you up, slowly blinking tears as you lay, limply, on your side, trying to steady your breathing. Every so often, your muscles twitch, without your control, and you have to let out a little whimpering sob from the pressure, clutching the knitted blankets like a lifeline.

An eternity or so later, Enoch returns, you hear his footsteps... paired with someone else. The door creaks open, and suddenly there's a light, but it's too bright for you to see anything beyond it.

"Oh, god, Enoch, what did you do?" The voice is unfamiliar, not cold, but filled with shock, which you suppose in your fevered state is a fair sentiment to have.

Enoch doesn't answer right away, but you can hear his movements hopping from one end of the room to the other. "What needed to be done."

"Stupid boy," the strangers mumbles, just barely loud enough for you to hear. She touches the bandages on your leg, unwrapping them and sucking in her breath when the wound is finally revealed. It hurts, everything hurts, you just want to be put out of your misery like an injured racehorse.

“I don’t want to be awake," you mumble miserably, everything washed in browns and grays.

“I know,” Enoch’s setting some things down on a table, “I brought something for that, too.”

A moment later, he’s back at your side, propping you up enough for you to swallow down a thick, sickly sweet syrup, one that leaves your mouth almost stinging as it goes down, the familiar bite of liquor coming back only in the aftertaste. Once you’re back down, you feel two sets of hands prodding at your wound, and though you know their movements are gentle, that does nothing to stop the tears from spilling out from your eyes. You try to steady your breathing, but find yourself spiraling down an even darker tunnel.

Are you asleep? Or have you died and gone to hell? You don’t know. The pain slowly bleeds away, and you wonder if this is what dying feels like, or if Enoch is gradually managing to heal the wound. An emptiness folds around you, like a cold, draining comfort, one that you are quick to grasp onto and hold. The heat flows away, drip by drip, a slow, arduous process, one that you feel like will never end. A part of you hopes that this is the end because at least then, you won’t have to feel any more of this pain… and as a soldier, you think you can appreciate that.

But you wake back up. At least, you think you’re awake again, the dark makes it awfully hard to tell. You cough, though your chest doesn’t seem to rattle with infection, which you suppose is a plus. There’s a throbbing pain in your leg, still, but it’s less prominent, like a dull echo of what it once was. There’s an unfamiliar sting to it, too and after prodding the area with your hands, you find that the full leg is still attached, thank god. Letting out a breath of relief, you test your boundaries, finding that even though you can wriggle your foot around, the actual leg is pretty useless.

“You’re awake?” It’s Enoch, his voice coming from below the foot of the bed, as though he’s been resting against the side, sitting on the floor.

“Yeah.” Your voice is gravelly, dry.

“What’s my name?” He asks, standing back up, the soft rustle of fabric following his movements.

“Um… Enoch?” The way he asks makes you doubt yourself.

“Yes,” he sounds relieved, “you’ve been delirious over the past few days. I just wanted to make sure.”

“Oh,” you say, a tad sheepishly, “was it bad?”

“Not… really,” he sounds like he’s trying to not cause you panic, though, “but drastic measures had to be taken. Not for the delirium, for the injury.”

Again, you’re checking to make sure the leg is still there. Are you experiencing a ghost limb? You can’t even look, so you don’t know, is this what having a ghost limb feels like? “Did you- um, is it-”

“I had to call in a second doctor, one with eyes,” he reaches over, messing with the bandages on your leg. “I missed a small metal fragment, but she was able to remove it.”

You reach over to his hand, moving it down ever so slightly to make sure that the leg is still there, through his perspective. “My leg… it’s still there?”

“Yes, luckily,” he says, awkwardly patting your hand. “And it seems like you’re going to keep it, the other doctor was optimistic, given the circumstances.”

“What does that mean, given the circumstances?”

“Oh,” he tries to brush it off, “she wasn’t… well, thrilled that I have you here, which, given the nature of things-”

“I understand.” If the neighboring villages are being overrun by the opposing army, you’re going to be putting these people in danger. “I can leave.”

“No,” Enoch says sharply, “not until you can walk.”

“Come on,” you’re getting exasperated, the guilt beginning to nibble away at your conscious, “I don’t want to put you in any danger. You and your doctor friend have already done more than enough for me, so-”

“Absolutely not.” He’s not giving you any room to argue. “You can’t even stand on your own, there is no way you can leave and survive.”

“I can,” you try to defend yourself.

“Then get up and walk to the other side of the room.”

You sit up, quietly, surprised that he would even offer the challenge and manage to swing your uninjured leg onto the cold, stone floor. The twisting movement sends a shockwave up your pelvis, and even though it isn’t nearly as terrible as even a few days ago, it’s still enough for you to take in a deep, sharp breath. “I can’t even see where the other side of the room is.”

“I will guide you.”

Slowly, but surely, you begin to maneuver your injured leg over the side of the mattress, trying your damnedest to keep from making any pained noises. Once you manage to slide down to the floor, you test your weight on it, finding that you shouldn’t even shift, because fuck, that smarts. You don’t cry, though, you think you’ve cried enough tears to last you years to come.

“Having trouble?” Enoch has the audacity to ask.

You grit your teeth and try to take a step forward, failing spectacularly, pitching face-first onto the ground. If Enoch didn’t have the foresight to reach over and grab for your undershirt, he’d probably have a broken nose on his hands, too. He helps you back up, lifting your injured leg over the mattress himself because you just can’t seem to get your muscles to work. “Ow. Ow, ow, ow-”

“Oh, please,” he says, sounding peeved, “if you had just listened, we wouldn’t be here now, would we?”

Grumbling, you settle back down onto the bed, and once you promise not to try walking again without his help, he hands over another mug of broth. As you slowly sip your meal, you try to listen to his movements, and then try to discern what he’s up to. This has to be some kind of room that holds a purpose more than ‘guest bedroom’ because he always seems to be tinkering with something or another when you’re awake.

You go in and out of sleep, waking up to eat and drink, resting away whatever infection had festered in your wound. Every day you feel a little better, and though once you’re not at death’s door, you realize you might be somewhere worse; boredom. Laying limply in the pitch darkness isn’t exactly an excellent way to pass the long hours of healing, especially when you’re lucid enough to sense every passing moment in time. Enoch’s company, when you have it, is the highlight of your days, but he has things to do beyond check your wounds and tinker around the room.

“Is this like your bedroom or something?” You ask because you don’t want to be stealing his bed.

“No,” he says, and then when you make a frustrated sound, he adds, “an office of sorts, I guess. I keep records and extra equipment in here.”

“You have an office with a bed?”

“Sometimes, I’d like to just lay down if I have a late night.”

You let out a laugh, which turns into a cough, and you have to calm yourself down before saying anything else. “I’m sorry, you just… don’t feel like actually going to your room?”

“Sometimes,” he says, defensively, “or sometimes I stow an injured person away up here.”

“Huh.” You take another sip of broth. “So, you do this often?”

“Well, not too often. Not a lot of injured soldiers fall into my mushroom patch.”

“Hm.” That makes you feel warm inside. “I’m surprised. Are you sure you’re not hiding some other soldier in the downstairs cupboard?”

“Would that make you upset if I was?”

“Oh, deeply, darling, and here I thought we were bonding.”

There’s a harsh puff of hair exhaling from his lungs, and you realize that he’s laughing. “I’m so sorry, love, that one means absolutely nothing to me.”

“No, no, I’m done. I’m leaving you.”

“No, I beg of you. There must be some way to earn your forgiveness, some deed to win back your favor.”

You actually think it over, folding your hands together, staring into the darkness, and you realize that there must be something you can request. “Come here.”

He steps over, you can hear the shoes moving against the stone. “Yes?”

“I don’t mean to be demanding, or anything,” you say softly, “but I don’t suppose you have a candle or lantern laying around anywhere?”

“Those aren’t usually things I keep on hand, no,” Enoch responds. “But I suppose you’d like to be able to see for a little while.”

“I just… feel almost like I’m going insane.” Then you remember the bit you were doing. “And I bet you give that whore in the cupboard all the candles in the world.”

Again, he laughs, quietly, and then pauses. “I’m sure you understand that I don’t really keep candles lying around, but… I will do my best to find you something.”

You feel relief running through your body. “Really?”

“Yes. Sip the rest of your broth and go to sleep.”

“Thank you.” You feel dazed, leaning back down against your pillow palace, drinking the broth as quickly as possible without calling any negative attention on yourself. When you hand the mug back, you breathe a quiet, “thank you, again.”

“Don’t thank me, yet.”

But he’s true to his word because when you wake back up, there’s a dim flicker almost blinding you when you slowly open your eyes. You blink rapidly, you almost can’t fucking believe it, Enoch really came through for you, and you spend what feels like an hour staring at the little flame, hypnotized by the light. Then, just to be sure, you look at your leg, seeing that everything is still attached, and breathe a sigh of relief. You reach over to the bed table it’s on and bring it over to your bandages, checking out the damage yourself.

The craftsmanship on the wrapping is top-notch, you don’t think Enoch could be lying to you about his skillset. This, actually, has to be the best care you’ve been under since you enlisted. Not to bash any of the field medics or anything, god knows how much effort they put into their work, but again, they can only do so much in the face of the horrors of injuries they have to fix. Enoch only has to deal with you. Allegedly.

Gradually, you begin to take in the room. You’re… underground, you think, which makes sense with the lack of windows, and you guess that for Enoch, it’s probably not that big of a deal to have his office down where no light would reach it. There are… shelves, yes, and a large table you assume he uses as a desk, with unfamiliar objects placed meticulously about, you believe that they’re probably his apothecary instruments. Scales and the like. You don’t know.

You can’t see what is stocked in the shelves, the light doesn’t reach that far, even with your eyes more sensitive to the darkness than you’ve been in your life. Careful, you look at your leg again, then test your weight on it by leaning forward. Ha. Yeah. You won’t be walking on that leg today, that’s for sure, so you can’t go up and snoop, which is unfortunate. You’re almost dying to know what Enoch gets up to while he’s tinkering around, but you suppose that it can wait until you’re able to start hobbling around on your own.

There’s a small book at the bedside, of which you’re hesitant to pick up, until you remember that Enoch would have absolutely no use for it. Carefully, you look over the pages, finding decorative illustrations covering the pages, along with small scribbles of text in a language you can’t even begin to identify. Still, the pictures themselves, all lovingly drawn in inks of different colors and hues, show a sort of journal, you think, categorizing different plants that are wholly unfamiliar. Blue-capped mushrooms, violet and pink speckled lichen, and an oddly petaled flower blooming in a star-shaped pattern.

You’re so enthralled in the book, you almost don’t notice the candle slowly dripping out of existence, the wax melting down to a puddle as the wick steadily burns out. For the last few moments of light, you stare at the flame, watching it flicker, hoping that it might never go out, and then you are pitched into blackness once again. Enoch returns a while later, you hear him come in through the door, his footsteps familiar enough that you would know if it were some other interloper. You’re still awake, staring at the area where the candle still is, and you let him set his things down before you try to speak.

“Thank you for the candle. And the book.”

“I’m glad you enjoyed,” Enoch is tinkering over in the direction of the table, “I figured you might have wanted something to keep you occupied.”

“Where did you get the book? It looks handprinted, and the illustrations are absolutely beautiful.” You don’t want to ask for another candle, but now you’re dying to know what Enoch looks like.

“I…” Enoch pauses, trying to come up with the words, “my parents were also apothecaries, and they would keep journals of their finds.”

Were, he’s speaking in the past tense, and so you’re quick to deflect from that conversation. In your panic, though, you immediately jump back to your original train of thought, which is you’d like to see him. “Do you know what I look like?”

“I don’t know what anything looks like.”

“Not that, I mean how you see things by touching them? Have you touched my face? Do you know what I look like?”

“Oh,” he’s quiet, now, “I have, when I first found you, just out of curiosity.”

“And?”

“And? You have a face. A nose. Eyes.... and a forehead.” A pause. “With a chin.”

You start laughing, and then immediately feel bad. “Do you want to do it again?”

“Do I want to touch your face again?”

“I wouldn’t mind it.”

For a moment, you’re worried that he won’t even respond, or that you’ve made things too awkward, but he pads closer. You can sit up all by yourself now, with no mountains of pillows to support your back, and you feel the warmth of his body as he leans against the bed, almost hesitant. His hands are warm, and calloused, and able to completely cover your face should he choose, though he’s more conservative than that.

Slowly, he starts with your eyes, gingerly running his thumbs over and around, gradually moving to your nose, where he seems to take an interest in its shape. His movements are careful, but also calculated, mapping out your cheeks, then your ears, his fingers traveling down to trace the outline of your chin. He goes up again, feeling out the area of your forehead, his thumbs focusing on that specific area more than the rest, before running his fingers through your hair.

While he’s focusing on your face, you bring your fingers up to touch his, gently cupping the edge of his chin. He flinches, though only slightly, but relaxes and lets you press your fingers against his face. His jawline is sharp, pointed, though you don’t know how to translate the things you feel into sight. Slowly, you bring your fingertips up to the side of his face, finding a prominent pair of cheekbones, moving up, and then swooping down into his jaw. His nose has a bump on the ridge, sliding downward into almost a hook. When you move upwards to his forehead, he lets out a quick, shuddering breath and pulls back.

“Sorry,” he says, muted, quiet, and moves back closer, “I suppose I’m not used to being on the receiving end of that.”

“We can stop-”

“No,” you feel his hands cover yours, leading them back up to his face, “this- this needs to be done.”

“If you want it,” you say, moving your hands back up, finding something… protruding from his forehead. You let out a little gasp, unbidden, pulling one hand away like it was burned, but place it back. It’s… it has to be a horn, you think, finding a matching on just above his other eyebrow. Two horns. Enoch has two horns. You’re silent, pondering what this could mean, when you notice that he is just as quiet, with an added layer of tenseness trembling in his skin.

He’s scared.

You take in a deep breath, wrapping your hands around the horns, finding they curve up and around, like a ram’s, and you say, “well, this is new.”

Enoch lets out a huff of air in a way that sounds like relief.

“Have- were you born with them, or?”

“Born.”

“Huh.” You don’t really know what to say to that, and all things aside… Enoch is kind. He never made you feel unsafe. And, for god’s sake, he pulled you out of death’s door when he didn’t really need to. “Interesting.”

“I have-” he hesitates, “another candle if you would like to see me.”

“I would if you wouldn’t mind.”

The bed shifts as he moves, wandering to the other side of the room. There’s a harsh click, and a bloom of soft, yellow light slowly grows to maturity. You can see his figure even from this far away, you suppose your eyes are so used to the darkness that you can see far better than usual with even the barest hint of a flame. He’s tall, remarkably so, which is something you had sort of known, judging by his movements, but seeing it is something else.

As he comes closer, you recognize the features you had felt on his face, the shape of the nose, the slope of his cheekbones. He sets the candle on the bed table, gently, and looks over in your direction, though his milky white eyes don’t seem to focus on anything, least of all you. His hair is long, dark, trailing behind his head in a slow mess of curls, his skin a dark, almost purple, but gray. Again, you raise your hands up to his face, feeling out his features, though following your fingers with your eyes.

“You’re beautiful,” you softly come to your conclusions, and you’re correct. Even if someone were repulsed by his inhuman elements- and you’re not- ignoring the skin color, pointed ears, and horns, his face is still of a remarkably symmetrical shape. And, best of all, above all, he is kind.

Enoch seems so off guard with your statement that he can’t seem to find his voice for a moment. “I- um, thank you.”

“No, thank you.” You take his hand and press it up to where your leg is injured, though the usual sharp pain of being prodded is muted by your body’s steady efforts to heal. “I would have died if it weren’t for you.”

“Yes.” The fact he doesn’t even put any effort in denying it shows how terrible the wound really was when you first arrived. “Most likely.”

You roll your eyes and bring his face close, giving him a soft kiss on the cheek. “Thank you for saving me.”

His body freezes against your mouth, and as he pulls back, his brow is furrowed in confusion, like he can’t quite process what you just did. “You- your welcome.”


End file.
